Monday, December 12, 2011

Stryker Buys Gaymar, Then Shuts Them Down

There has been quite a wave of layoffs/closings stories in the news the past few days. This one was about as appalling as the one I posted on Saturday about Hanes buying up a rival factory and moving it to Mexico:

Just a little more than a year after Gaymar Industries was acquired by Stryker Corp. in a $150 million cash deal, the company is now shutting its area operations.

The closings in Orchard Park and West Seneca will put approximately 160 people out of work.

The privately-held Orchard Park medical manufacturer, which specializes in support surface, pressure ulcer management solutions for the health-care industry, was bought by medical devices giant Stryker of Michigan in a deal announced in late summer 2010.

A statement from the company issued Thursday said the process of closing down production lines and relocating equipment to other Stryker sites or supply chain partners will take place in phases and will be completed by the end of 2012.

Okay, that's bad enough, but then there is this little tidbit:

When the transaction was announced, Gaymar CEO Kent Davies said, "We've been working with them for 10 years. It's always a subject to talk about how things can get better and where we can take the relationship."

"Where we can take the relationship," huh? That sounds like the kind of "relationship" a serial killer has with one of his victims, which I think is quite an apt metaphor in the wake of the Citizens United Supreme Court case declaring corporations to have the same "free speech" rights as human beings. Things certainly got better for the 160 Gaymar employees about to lose their jobs, all right. But that's okay, I'm sure former Gaymar CEO Kent Davis got HIS golden parachute while his employees were getting their golden showers from Stryker.

I just don't understand why people put up with the destruction of their livelihoods like this without so much as a peep of protest. Someone needs to go Occupy Stryker headquarters. That's it in the picture above. They're in Kalamazoo, Michigan, in case anyone is interested.